


Beneath our Feet: Home

by L_The_other_consulting_detective



Series: Home in the bonds we forge [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, But Only a Little Bit - Freeform, Earth, Fluff, M/M, SHEITH - Freeform, Soulmates, The cleanest thing I've written in ages, home stuff, iverson gets picked on, like home is not home stuff, pizza saves lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-11
Updated: 2018-07-11
Packaged: 2019-06-08 18:15:20
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,313
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15249096
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L_The_other_consulting_detective/pseuds/L_The_other_consulting_detective
Summary: Commander Iverson just wants to have one nice day, away from the disaster of a job he has after Kerberos. Too bad Voltron's found it's way too Earth and the paladins are hungry .Keith and Shiro spend a night in the shack and somethings become clearer for both of them.They've all come so far to be back here, but they have so far too go.The introduction for a series centered around Shiro and Keith's discovery of themselves, their soulbond, and their strengths.





	Beneath our Feet: Home

**Author's Note:**

> Come yell at me on tumblr!  
> sheith-talker.tumblr.com

Commander Michael Iverson just wanted to take a day off. Just one nice sunny day for himself out in the desert where he wouldn't have to hear anyone else or think of his tenuous grasp on things in the last year and change. Since the moment the Kerberos team vanished his life had been _very_ trying. First Kogane’s breakdown, assault and subsequent expulsion, then Shiroganes stellar solo return and immediate disappearance (and another assault from Kogane _and friends_ ) coupled with the disappearance of three other cadets, and topped off by his superiors placing him on a full and formal probation only to have Dr. Holt appear corroborating the half-crazed story Shirogane had been blabbering? Yeah, Iverson just wanted a day to leave that shit behind him.

Based on the large and all too real metal lions coming toward him from the sky? Unlikely. He knew exactly what they were, ships built by an ancient civilization in distant space to fight the threat all of Earth was scrambling to prep for, the lions of Voltron. Why they had to bother specifically him, since he was utterly alone and too far out for there to be anyone else, was a mystery.

At least until they made landfall, a wave of sand briefly blinding him his uninjured eye, and a too familiar and not-at-all missed voice came from one of the machines.

“ _Heeeey Shiro, isn’t that commander Iverson? Hello commander Iverson!”_

Lance. Which would mean that his other wayward cadets were probably also somehow involved. Suddenly Dr. Holt’s reluctance to give specifics about the Voltron paladins didn’t seem like a human’s respect for some foreign species and instead like a mischievous mans joke.

 

* * *

 

Coming in to the Earth’s atmosphere Shiro could feel the way Keith relaxed into his chair, the soulbond humming with a strange feeling of relief, nostalgia and longing. The way Keith smiled at him, a small quick thing, told him that his own feelings were coming through just as clear. Their descent, rapid though it was, took long enough for a touch of unease to filter through from both parties. They had come from Earth, the jewel of a planet with a population that they could no longer truly say they were part of, but the expanse of space felt a little more like home, especially when viewed through the windows of an Altean castle.

Not that Shiro wasn’t grateful to return to the planet he’d been born on, but it felt like returning to your parents house after you’d found one of your own, home but not quite. Keith seemed to agree with him as he piloted Black down between Pidge and Allura.

Lance’s voice, audible over both the comms and the god-mic system the lions had pulled all of their gazes to the coughing figure standing alone in the desert and Shiro groaned. Of course.  
 

“Lance, cease and desist.”

“Okay but Shiro, my man, he is like, the only one out here. What are the chances?”

“Pretty low I’d say. It’s a sign, we should make him think we’re gonna step on him.”

“We should _actually_ step on him.”

“Hunk, Pidge, also cease and desist. Keith stop thinking about doing that too him, I’ll go greet him.”

“I think we should all go.” Allura’s voice, mildly confused at the sudden outpouring of dislike from all of the paladins but still calm, came through.

“I agree. He is one man, there’s little threat and if you all know him it might be the fastest way to announce your returns.” Krolia provided another level head, though even her tone was colored with distaste and Shiro could only assume Keith had told her stories.

Shiro leaned forward and hit the god-mic switch for Black, “ _Commander Iverson, if you give us a second, we’re coming out.”_

No one waited for an affirmative from the man on the ground before the paladins, Krolia, Coran, Romelle, and Matt all piled out of their respective lions.

The first steps made Shiro shudder and he saw the way the others responded to their home world, as well as the soft pain in the Altean’s faces as they watched their friends come home. The only one that was a surprise was Krolia, kneeling briefly, her fingers just brushing the sand and Keith, standing tall beside her, the only one with no reaction to the literal Earth beneath his feet. The feeling in Shiro’s chest told him why.

Keith felt a softness toward their homeworld, but anywhere with Shiro, with the others, was home first and besides, his gaze was focused ahead.

Iverson was coming toward them, standing tall and for a split second Shiro felt like a cadet about to be reprimanded but then Allura stepped forward and Iverson halted and the mantle of the person he’d been when Earth had been the only world he knew fell away.

“Greetings commander Iverson. I am Princess Allura of Altea and these are the Paladins of Voltron, we have urgent news and a request for Dr. Holt, if you could help us find him?”

Iverson looked around at them all and Shiro noted the way he didn’t seem to know what to address first. He settled for a nod and a , “Of course Princess. If you’d give me some leeway to speak with _my cadets_ first I can-”

“No one here is a cadet anymore...sir. We’re Paladins of Voltron, defenders of the universe. Every human here would’ve more than met the requirements to graduate the Garrison and to be frank, commander, one of us,” Shiro pushed Keith forward a little, “could blow the whole thing sky high without security ever knowing we’d been there. Also Matt outranks you thanks to the honorary titles when he died.”

Iverson’s face was red and his good eye ticked as he was forced to face them as equals if not betters and he looked back at Allura’s cool expression before turning on his heel and silently leading them back toward the Garrison.

Matt looked surprised for a moment and then grinned and high-fived Shiro before they all followed.

 

* * *

 

The stir caused by their return would’ve put Keith’s back against a wall once, before he’d spent a year with a hole where his soulmate belonged, before he’d spent two years in a time flux with his Galran mother, before Voltron and Zarkon and everything. Now it was almost amusing and the others seemed to think the same.

They’d been given permission to gather any possessions left behind, which of course only Hunk, Pidge, Matt, and Lance had, but Keith and Shiro had tagged along for fun.

The initial meeting had been fast, kept quiet and Coran was even now pouring over the plans he’d left with Dr. Holt, but the paladins were allowed to roam the Garrison basically as they pleased so long as they kept their reasons for returning….well, as long as they lied.

Lance had decided their cover story was, “We all got abducted by aliens but what do you do you know?” and no one had cared to argue, by the next morning Allura would have a show set up for them and they’d be working Earth into the Alliance. No need to make up a real cover.

The first cadet to see them was young. Too young to recognize Keith at all or place the others but Matt and Shiro made his eyes bulge wide and his mouth opened like a fish. Lance slid to his side and clapped his shoulder, leaning in and…

“Go. Tell. Everyone.”

“ _Lance.”_ Hunk sounded more proud than disapproving and Shiro just sighed.

The kid was already gone, the sound of his voice calling, “Takashi Shirogane and Matt Holt are _back”_ echoing from the dorm hall.

Shiro tipped his head toward the small collection desk where cadets possessions were sent for pick up from the larger containment area in the compound, Iverson had promised the left behind items would be there.

They didn’t make it to the desk before a group of older cadets, probably starting their final year, cut them off. Shiro, Matt and Keith hung back a little ways, less visible under a malfunctioning light. These ones recognized the entire group and Shiro felt Keith’s emotions close down tight, the bond sealing on his side even as Lance grinned.

“Hey there guys! Miss us?”

The cadet in front, clearly the leader of the group, raised his eyebrows, “Why would anyone miss you? We all thought you’d gone out into the desert and died and you know what, the thought was a comfort, though I guess a few of us bet you’d just washed out like Kogane. Think he’s killed himself yet? Hell even Shiro died off planet trying to get away from him.”

Keith’s jaw clenched and Matt hissed but before any of them could move Lance had stepped into the guys space, all amusement gone, “Just because you couldn’t fly out a paper bag doesn’t mean that Keith doesn’t deserve your respect.”

Hunk caught Lance’s shoulder, tugging him out of the guys face and Pidge snorted at the look of immediate confusion, as far as anyone who had known them was aware Lance hated Keith.

“Seriously, you guys need to grow up. Learn to use your eyes before you talk bad about someone standing right in front of you.”

The lead cadet glared and opened his mouth, no doubt to spit something horrid back and Shiro decided it was time to intervene.

 

“If you have anything worth saying, say it to me, otherwise I’d suggest staying quiet.” His voice was even as he stepped forward, letting them see his face, the ice white hair and silver arm that Coran and Slav had pulled together when they’d stopped on Olkarion gleaming.

The group as a whole took a step back and Keith brushed against him as he came forward as well, his violet eyes a little too bright, teeth too sharp and ears too pointed to be normal. He didn’t lash out though, and Shiro was proud of him for that, as the tension zapped between the two groups.

“You...you’re all...they said you were dead!” A girl to the side says, eyes gone huge as she takes in Shiro and then shudders when she looks at Keith.

“Well, no ones dead, but some of us have places to be and I don’t know about anybody else here but I just remembered there’s a pizza place close to here and uh...Hunk want Earth food.”

The tension snapped as Keith and Shiro both relaxed and Matt laughed, slinging an arm around Pidge as they all pushed past the stunned group of cadets to finish gathering their things.

“Woo-hoo! Pizza!” Lance crowed.

 

Cadet Tanner had the strangest feeling pizza had just saved his life, a feeling amplified when Keith Kogane, his personal favorite punching bag when they’d been first years, stepped past him and the hilt of a knife flashed above the hem of his pants.

He gripped his chest as he and his friends watched the group walk away, shoving at each other and looking for all the world like typically fourth years. Shirogane’s white hair throwing light on the floor behind him.

 

* * *

 

Allura hadn’t liked it, but she’d taken one look at the emptiness that had come over Shiro when he’d been shown to his room in the dorms, and she’d allowed it. Keith would have to thank her somehow, later.

For right now he was enjoying the feeling of Shiro’s arms looped around his waist as they sped away from the Garrison on a borrowed hover bike. It didn’t handle as well as his old red one but it was pretty fast and he laughed, giddy, as they skipped over small dunes. Shiro’s laughter in his ear was a gift, something Keith savored as the bond, strong in his chest, sang.

Their lions were visible to their left, lit with the rays of the setting sun, but Keith wasn’t headed their. If they were going home then they were going home properly.

The shack rose up in front of them as the final light of day slipped past the horizon and Keith turned off the hover bike, his thighs tingling as the vibration faded. Shiro let him go, sliding off and stumbling a little on the sand as he stepped forward. Keith didn’t laugh, concern pinching his brows for a brief moment before smoothing away. Shiro was fine, just a little clumsy in his rush to get into a real bed.

Keith couldn’t blame him, the lions were not exactly comfortable for extended periods and their last planetside rest had been almost two full phoebs ago. Keith opened the door, even as he contemplated how easily Earth terms had fallen away  and thought about mentioning to Shiro that they would need to provide a more exact list of time adjustments from ticks to deca-phoebs to the Garrison, but the thought was lost as he took his soulmate in.

“Shiro?”

Nothing, just grey eyes staring out at the desert, looking toward the caves where they’d found the blue lion, where everything had really started.

“Takashi?” Keith’s voice was softer around the rarely used, but no less loved, word.

That got his attention and Shiro turned to him with a distracted sort of smile, “Sorry. It...wow. Last time I was here everything was happening so fast I didn’t even get to really think about the fact that I was back on Earth...that this is where you were living.You never told me how you ended up out here?”

Keith shrugged, stepping more fully into the tiny house and Shiro followed, closing the door behind them and following Keith to the bed that puffed dust into the air when they sat on it.

“It wasn’t much of a story really. Kerberos happened and I was so...I knew it wasn’t true but I didn’t know _why_ and Iverson called me to his office after a sparring match. I broke a cadet’s arm because we were mid-match and he asked me why I was trying since there was no one around to impress anymore and I just...I was so angry Shiro. I knew you were out there but it was like they were trying to drill the words “Pilot Error” into me because they knew it too and they had to cover.”

Keith took a breath, his voice pitched lower and Shiro reached for him, tucking him into his side on the bed, the fitted black fabric they both wore bunching at under his hand.

“I punched Iverson. I wasn’t as strong then, if I’d hit him the same way now I’d have killed him. It’s why his eye’s weird now. I didn’t have to hear the word to know I was expelled and I grabbed your bike and I ran here. It was alright, a roof and no one bothered me.”

Shiro’s lips thinned but he didn’t call Keith on the lie, giving him a tight squeeze, and then releasing him so they could each tug off their shoes. The soft standard clothing they wore out of uniform was comfortable enough to sleep in and they hadn’t exactly wanted to cart much around that they didn’t need to. After all the more stuff they took off the lions the more stuff their was to forget.

Once Keith had lain down Shiro settled behind him, arm resting across the smaller male’s hips. There was a beat of silence, then Shiro sighed. They were both tired but their internal clocks were adjusted for different stretches of time than a single Earth day now. Most often they were awake the better part of a quintant, sleeping for short bursts in between their work since it had long been the most efficient way to handle things.

Keith was still quiet and Shiro felt the desert around him, it settled him a little, the light sound of sand against the wood of the house in a light wind, something a cricket sang. Still, last time he was here had been so rushed, his head so foggy, now he was looking around in the low light of the stars and slowly rising moon, and he could see it.

Keith’s pain was here, the pain of someone who had no one left, in the neatly kept space with frayed and aged furniture, the map of the stars pinned on the other wall, a stack of information about Kerberos pinned around it. Marks in the wall that Shiro would bet money were from Keith throwing his knife.

“Keith...you never said, how you knew I was alive.”

Keith’s breathing hitches but he doesn’t answer for a long while and Shiro is going to ask again when he finally speaks.

“I didn’t know, when you were still here even, why I would feel things sometimes, just little bits of them, that weren’t _me._ I’d feel so happy sometimes, or tired, or just anything for a minute or two and it was like the feelings were coming from somewhere else. The night you disappeared I was sick with fear.”

He goes quiet again and Shiro presses his fingers, his flesh ones, against the center of Keith’s chest, resting behind him fully again. He doesn’t know what to say.

“It didn’t go away, just changed. I kept feeling things and I knew then I think, that it was you, your feelings. The fear and anger and determination. I could never, who I was then could never have felt those things so strongly. Then one day it was all gone.”

Shiro inhales sharply, confused, but Keith isn’t done and though it can’t be easy to be so open, even now, he keeps going.

“I’d just come out here and the feelings stopped coming, I was alone with myself. I thought it meant you’d died. I laid down in this bed then and I thought about never getting up again. I think I spent a day just laying here, wondering how long it would take to die like that when I realized that I could still sort of...you were still there. Like the shape of you, the outline of the feelings were just barely still there. I got up after that even though it didn’t get stronger, not until after we were in the castle.”

He falls silent and Shiro crushes him to his chest, pressing a kiss into Keith’s hair and thinking. He remembers now, but so vaguely, the druids had him and he could feel the growing concern, the feeling swelling in his chest that wasn’t his and he knew in his heart that if didn’t do _something_ whatever the druids did to him was going to reach...well he hadn’t known then, at least not how he did now. He remembers how it felt like he was tearing himself in two with how hard he tried to disconnect from the feelings from someone else, the rubber band recoil when it worked. The searing joy when Keith had grabbed him after the trials of Marmora, Kolivans knowledge a benediction to them then.

“I’m sorry. I think I cut you off, I wanted to protect you.”

Keith sighs and Shiro feels his nod as he shifts around so he can pull his soulmate down into a kiss.

“It’s okay, not like you could’ve known.”

Shiro smiles a little, settling in more fully and closing his eyes, sleep is still a ways off but laying with Keith is just as good.

“I love you.”

Keith’s little laugh is the only answer he needs but he appreciates it when the smaller male speaks, “ Love you too.”

They fall quiet, waiting comfortably for sleep, readying themselves for rebuilding the castle and finishing the things they’ve started, the sounds of their homeworld outside soothing something unnamable.

  



End file.
